Brno
Brno ( , ; german: Brünn ) is a city in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. Located at the confluence of the Svitava and Svratka rivers, Brno has about 380,000 inhabitants, making it the second-largest city in the Czech Republic ...
– 4 July 1967, Prague) was a
Czech
Czech may refer to:
* Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe
** Czech language
** Czechs, the people of the area
** Czech culture
** Czech cuisine
* One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus'
Places
* Czech, ...
painter, illustrator, writer, journalist and
entomologist
Entomology () is the scientific study of insects, a branch of zoology. In the past the term "insect" was less specific, and historically the definition of entomology would also include the study of animals in other arthropod groups, such as arach ...
. He is known mainly as an author of children books. Sekora was also one of the first propagators of
rugby
Rugby may refer to:
Sport
* Rugby football in many forms:
** Rugby league: 13 players per side
*** Masters Rugby League
*** Mod league
*** Rugby league nines
*** Rugby league sevens
*** Touch (sport)
*** Wheelchair rugby league
** Rugby union: 1 ...
Vyškov
Vyškov (; german: Wischau) is a town in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 20,000 inhabitants. The historic town centre is well preserved and is protected by law as an urban monument zone.
Administrative parts
Vyškov ...
.Menclová (2005), p. 588 He then studied at the ''Faculty of Law'' of
Masaryk University
Masaryk University (MU) ( cs, Masarykova univerzita; la, Universitas Masarykiana Brunensis) is the second largest university in the Czech Republic, a member of the Compostela Group and the Utrecht Network. Founded in 1919 in Brno as the seco ...
. From 1921 he worked as a sports editor, illustrator, reporter and commentator for ''
Lidové noviny
''Lidové noviny'' (''People's News'', or ''The People's Newspaper'', ) is a daily newspaper published in Prague, the Czech Republic. It is the oldest Czech daily still in print, and a newspaper of record. In 1923 he married Markéta Kalabusová, but was divorced a year later. From 1929 to 1931 he studied privately as a pupil of Professor Arnošt Hofbauer. In 1927 the editorial office of ''Lidové noviny'' moved to Prague.
Sekora married his second wife, Ludmila Roubíčková, in 1931. A year later she bore him a son, who was also named Ondřej. In 1941, during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, he was forced to leave his job and expelled from the ''Federation of Czech Journalists''. The reason was his mixed marriage. His second wife, Ludmila, was of
Jewish
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
as racially mixed. From October 1944 to April 1945, he was imprisoned in the German
labor camp
A labor camp (or labour camp, see spelling differences) or work camp is a detention facility where inmates are forced to engage in penal labor as a form of punishment. Labor camps have many common aspects with slavery and with prisons (especi ...
s in Kleinstein (
Poland
Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...
) and Osterode (Germany). His wife was deported to the
Theresienstadt concentration camp
Theresienstadt Ghetto was established by the Schutzstaffel, SS during World War II in the fortress town of Terezín, in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia (German occupation of Czechoslovakia, German-occupied Czechoslovakia). Theresienstad ...
. In Osterode, Sekora met and befriended Czech actor
Oldřich Nový
Oldřich Nový (7 August 1899, in Prague – 15 March 1983, in Prague) was a Czech film and theatre actor, director, composer, dramaturg and singer. He is considered one of the greatest actors of the Czech cinema in the first half of the 20th c ...
, with whom he attempted to organize the
puppet theatre
Puppetry is a form of theatre or performance that involves the manipulation of puppets – inanimate objects, often resembling some type of human or animal figure, that are animated or manipulated by a human called a puppeteer. Such a performa ...
in the camp. Both Sekora and his wife survived the imprisonment, and he later described his experience in his diary.
Following World War II he worked as an editor in the magazines ''Práce'' (''Work'') and ''Dikobraz'' (''Porcupine''). From 1949 he also led one of the sections of the ''Státní nakladatelství dětské knihy'' (SNDK) (''State Publishing House of Children Books''). In his later years Sekora devoted himself solely to painting, writing and illustration. In 1964 he was awarded the ''
Meritorious Artist
Merited Artist of the Russian Federation (russian: link=no, Заслуженный артист Российской Федерации, ''Zasluzhenny artist Rossiyskoy Federatsii'') is an honorary title in the Russian Federation. The title is ...
'' title, and in 1966 he received the ''
Marie Majerová
Marie Majerová (1 February 1882 – 16 January 1967) was a Czech writer and translator.
Biography
The daughter of working-class parents, she was born in Úvaly and grew up in Kladno. When she was sixteen, she began working as a servant in B ...
Prize''. His public activities ceased in 1964, after a heart attack. He died in 1967, and is buried in Prague-Košíře.
He was a member of the
Communist Party of Czechoslovakia
The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (Czech and Slovak: ''Komunistická strana Československa'', KSČ) was a communist and Marxist–Leninist political party in Czechoslovakia that existed between 1921 and 1992. It was a member of the Cominte ...
. In the post-war years he actively participated in the Czechoslovak communist agitation and propaganda.
Sekora trained the first Czech rugby clubs, ''Moravská Slávie'' in Brno-Pisárky and ''AFK Žižka'' Brno among others. He also created the Czech rugby terminology. He co-founded and edited the magazine ''Sport''.
The
Main-belt asteroid
The asteroid belt is a torus-shaped region in the Solar System, located roughly between the orbits of the planets Jupiter and Mars. It contains a great many solid, irregularly shaped bodies, of many sizes, but much smaller than planets, called ...
13406 Sekora, discovered in 1999, is named after him.
(as it was then) by Ondřej Sekora, when he returned from living in France in 1926, with a rugby ball and set of rules.Richards p129
Brno
Brno ( , ; german: Brünn ) is a city in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. Located at the confluence of the Svitava and Svratka rivers, Brno has about 380,000 inhabitants, making it the second-largest city in the Czech Republic ...
, the
Moravia
Moravia ( , also , ; cs, Morava ; german: link=yes, Mähren ; pl, Morawy ; szl, Morawa; la, Moravia) is a historical region in the east of the Czech Republic and one of three historical Czech lands, with Bohemia and Czech Silesia.
The me ...
, and is where the first match took place, between SK ''Moravská Slávie'', based in Brno-Pisárky, and ''AFK Žižka'', based in Brno. Both of these teams were trained by Sekora, who also coined
Czech language
Czech (; Czech ), historically also Bohemian (; ''lingua Bohemica'' in Latin), is a West Slavic language of the Czech–Slovak group, written in Latin script. Spoken by over 10 million people, it serves as the official language of the Czech Re ...
rugby terminology.
Style
Sekora became popular as an author of comic strips, published in ''Lidové noviny'' in the 1930s and at the beginning of the 1940s. He was inspired by cartoons of
Walt Disney
Walter Elias Disney (; December 5, 1901December 15, 1966) was an American animator, film producer and entrepreneur. A pioneer of the American animation industry, he introduced several developments in the production of cartoons. As a film p ...
,
Wilhelm Busch
Heinrich Christian Wilhelm Busch (14 April 1832 – 9 January 1908) was a German humorist, poet, illustrator, and painter. He published wildly innovative illustrated tales that remain influential to this day.
Busch drew on the tropes of f ...
and
Albert Dubout
Albert Dubout (15 May 1905 – 27 June 1976) was a French cartoonist, illustrator, Painting, painter, and sculpture, sculptor.
Biography
Albert Dubout was born in Marseille. After attending school at Nîmes (where he met Jean Paulhan) he s ...
. His short stories were full of humor, with indications of situation comedy. The basis of his style was lively and dynamic drawing with clear contours, accompanied with quatrains. His verses were often inspired by folk speech. He is known as the creator of animated characters ''
Ferda Mravenec
Ferda (means "Ferdinand the Ant", translated as Ferdy/Ferdi outside of the Czech Republic and Slovakia) is a Czech literary and comics character, an anthropomorphic ant created by Ondřej Sekora, who both wrote and illustrated the stories. It was ...
'' (''"Ferda the Ant"'') and ''Brouk Pytlík'' (''"Pouch the Beetle"'').
Selected works
Books
* ''Rugby, jak se hraje a jeho pravidla'' ("Rugby, How to Play It and the Rules") (1926, translated from French)
* ''
Ferda Mravenec
Ferda (means "Ferdinand the Ant", translated as Ferdy/Ferdi outside of the Czech Republic and Slovakia) is a Czech literary and comics character, an anthropomorphic ant created by Ondřej Sekora, who both wrote and illustrated the stories. It was ...
'' ("Ferda the Ant") (1936)
* ''Ferda Mravenec v cizích službách'' (1937)
* ''Ferda v mraveništi'' ("Ferda in the Anthill") (1938)
* ''Ferdův slabikář'' ("Ferdas Primer") (1939)
* ''Trampoty brouka Pytlíka'' ("Troubles of Pouch the Beetle") (1939)
* ''Malířské kousky brouka Pytlíka'' (1940)
* ''Kuře Napipi a jeho přátelé'' ("The Chicken Napipi and its Friends")(1941)
* ''Uprchlík na ptačím stromě'' (1943) (awarded at the
Expo 58
Expo 58, also known as the 1958 Brussels World's Fair (french: Exposition Universelle et Internationale de Bruxelles de 1958, nl, Brusselse Wereldtentoonstelling van 1958), was a world's fair held on the Heysel/Heizel Plateau in Brussels, Bel ...
in Brussels)
* ''Ferda cvičí mraveniště'' (1947)
* ''Kronika města Kocourkova'' ("The Chronicles of the Town of Kocourkov") (1947)
* ''Jak se uhlí pohněvalo'' (1949)
* ''Pohádka o stromech a větru'' (Fairy Tale about the Trees and Wind") (1949)
* ''O zlém brouku Bramborouku'' (1950)
* ''Ferda Mravenec ničí škůdce přírody'' (1951)
* ''Malované počasí'' (Painted Weather") (1951)
* ''O traktoru, který se splašil'' (1951)
* ''Mravenci se nedají'' (1954)
* ''Na dvoře si děti hrály'' (1955)
* ''Čmelák Aninka'' ("Aninka the Bumblebee") (1959)
* ''Hurá za Zdendou'' (1960)
* ''O psu vzduchoplavci'' (1961)
* ''Pošta v ZOO'' ("Post in ZOO") (1963)
The first three books about ''Ferda Mravenec'' (Ferda the Ant) were published in 1960s under the title ''Knížka Ferdy Mravence'' (The Book of Ferda the Ant).
Both books of ''Brouk Pytlík'' ("Pouch the Beetle") were published since 1969 under the title ''Brouk Pytlík''.
Comics
* ''Voříškova dobrodružství'' (1926)
* ''Jak Cvoček honil pytláka'' (1932)
* ''Kapitán Animuk loví v Africe'' (1934)
* ''Hej a Rup'' (1935)
* ''Slavnost u broučků'' (1938)
* ''Kousky mládence Ferdy Mravence'' (1950)
* ''Nápady kuřete Napipi'' (1961)
* ''Kapitán Animuk opět loví v Africe'' (1972)
Book illustration
*
Jindřich Plachta
Jindřich Plachta, born Jindřich Šolle (1 July 1899 – 6 November 1951) was a Czechoslovak film actor. He appeared in more than 100 films between 1926 and 1951.
Selected filmography
* '' The Lovers of an Old Criminal'' (1927)
* '' Fathe ...
: ''Pučálkovic Amina'' (1931)
*
Vladislav Vančura
Vladislav Vančura () (23 June 1891 in Háj ve Slezsku – 1 June 1942 in Prague) was an important Czech writer active in the 20th century, who was murdered by the Nazis. He was also active as a film director, playwright and screenwriter.
Early ...
: ''Kubula a Kuba Kubikula'' (1931)
* Hugo Vavris: ''František Lelíček ve službách Sherlocka Holmese'' (1932)
*
František Langer
František Langer (3 March 1888 – 2 August 1965) was a Czech-Jewish playwright, screenwriter, essayist, literary critic, publicist and military physician.
Life
Langer was born and in Prague, Austria-Hungary in a Czech speaking Jewish fam ...
: ''Bratrstvo bílého klíče'' (1934)
*
Jiří Weiss
Jiří Weiss (29 March 1913 – 9 April 2004) was a Czech film director, screenwriter, writer, playwright and pedagogue.
Life Early life
Jiří Weiss was born to a wealthy Jewish family in Prague. He was named after Czech king Jiří z Poděbrad ...
: ''O věrné Hadimršce … a co se kolem ní sběhlo'' (1935) published by Melantrich
*
Arthur Ransome
Arthur Michell Ransome (18 January 1884 – 3 June 1967) was an English author and journalist. He is best known for writing and illustrating the ''Swallows and Amazons'' series of children's books about the school-holiday adventures of childre ...
: ''Zamrzlá loď kapitána Flinta'' (1937)
*
Josef Kopta
Josef Kopta (16 June 1894 in Libochovice, Bohemia – 3 April 1962 in Prague) was a Czech writer and journalist.
Before World War I Kopta worked as a bank clerk. In 1914 he was sent to the Eastern front, in 1915 taken prisoner and later joined C ...
: ''Smějte se s bláznem'' (1939)
* Jarmila Hašková: ''Z notesu svatého Petra'' (1940)
* Jan Karafiát: ''Broučci'' (1940)
* Josef Věromír Pleva: ''Malý Bobeš'' (1941)
* Ema Tintěrová: ''Veselé příhody kozy Lujzy a kocoura Bobka'' (1942),
* Jan Malík: ''Míček Flíček'' (1946),
*
Mikhail Zoshchenko
Mikhail Mikhailovich Zoshchenko (russian: Михаи́л Миха́йлович Зо́щенко; – 22 July 1958) was a Soviet and Russian writer and satirist.
Biography
Zoshchenko was born in 1894, in Saint Petersburg, Russia, according to h ...
: ''Psí čich'' (1946),
* Eduard Štorch: ''Lovci mamutů na Bílé skále'' (1946)
*
Václav Čtvrtek
Václav Cafourek (4 April 1911, in Prague, Austria-Hungary – 6 November 1976, in Prague, Czechoslovakia), commonly known under his pen name of Václav Čtvrtek was a Czechs, Czech poet and author. His most famous works include Křemílek an ...
: ''Lev utekl'' (1948)
* František Němec: ''Soudničky'' (1948)
* Ema Řezáčová: ''Dům na kolečkách'' (1948)
* Václav Lacina: ''Slyš a piš'' ("Listen and Write") (1949)
* Jarmila Minaříková: ''Ježourek a Pišta, jeho bratr'' (1949)
* Irina Karnauchová: ''Chytrý sedláček a jiné pohádky'' ("Clever Peasant and Other Fairytales")(1954)
*
Gianni Rodari
Giovanni Francesco "Gianni" Rodari (; 23 October 1920 – 14 April 1980) was an Italian writer and journalist, most famous for his works of children's literature, notably '' Il romanzo di Cipollino''. For his lasting contribution as a children's ...
Rugby union in the Czech Republic
Rugby union in the Czech Republic is a minor sport. As of 1 November 2010, they are currently ranked thirty-first in the International Rugby Board's world rankings,.
Traditionally, Czech rugby has centred on a "section of the middle class" in an ...